Genealogy Chat

Hi all,

I came here as an absolute novice to all this genealogy malarkey, I opened up MY tree to all and sundry, now I'm no thicko, but I was just excited that there might be people out there that would share some part in my family's history. Gullible? Maybe. Excited? Definitely.

We're all quick to do the "It's your own fault, don't share...rah rah rah" but even the most careful can sometimes get dragged into it. Often someone with 40,000 names in their tree is a "collector", it's often a give-away to what they're looking for, so just ask them lots of questions first, to see if there is a connection. Then if you're happy to go ahead, well do it!

Someone who was related to my 10x Gt Grandmother's sister, on my Mum's side, added all my details, including my ex-husband (YES, I do have his permission before I'm asked!!) and all the relatives from my Dad's side...how that could ever be relevant to anyone, I swear I don't know, but I asked them politely if they could remove them, and they did.

Job done.

As I say, I was an utter novice when it came to genealogy, but I learnt the hard way. YES, no-one "owns" my tree - not even me really, but I just find it a bit pointless that they should want that kind of info, if they do, well, whatever.

I am currently receiving messages from someone who is giving me one-line questions - but no answers, and seems to have no idea on how to ask for things politely, no hello's, could you help me, best wishes, thanks for your help... so I'm now going to "politely" ignore him.

I no longer open my tree on request, I ask questions first, and after often many messages later, if there is a DEFINITE connection, then I'll share what I have.

Merry Christmas all!
Heidi

When I first started some years ago, like many others, I rarely questioned the information that others provided. These days I am much more wary and double check everything first. If I can't find any corroborative evidence then I don't assume it is correct.

I had a contact only this week with someone who has a connection with one of my wife's lines. However I think it is flawed, and the member has recorded the fact that the link is not proven. A bit more research is needed first.

I do think that copying huge chunks of tress just for the sake of it is rather pointless. For me there has to be some reason, even if it only the desire to learn more about that particular branch of the tree.

i have shared my tree with many people,and through doing so have met up with cousins i had not met ive also met an aunt and uncle that i had not seen in over 30 years as we had lost touch.ive also had trees opened upto me for which im very grateful as ive been able to couble check the information that i already had and vice vesa .i dont copy anyones trees i use theres to point me in the right direction .trevor

Peter,

You are absolutely right. I haven't anywhere near as many names as you, but my reason for being on this site is to find more information about my relatives.

I have done that with the help of some excellent people who were prepared to share their tree with me and give me some help and information. For me, this is only a starting point as I then check everything out before adding any names to my tree. Everyone on my tree means something to me and they wouldn't be there if they didn't.

However, I choose to share my tree and the people I share it with are free to use the information how they wish - if it helps someone that's fine, but if they want to just copy my information - good luck to them.

We all have similar but slightly different reasons for being on this site and I am not personally concerned about allowing access to my tree to those who have a good reason to ask - what they do with it is up to them.

Lynn

This topic comes up about as regularly as the moon circles the earth.

I have over 10,000 names in my master tree, but am by no means a name collector. All are connected, one way or the other.The reason I have so many is that for several surnames, I enjoy doing mini one-name studies, usually based on a particular area, and each can soon run up to several hundred names.

I have shared my tree with over 200 people on this site, and only once have encountered someone who wanted to copy the lot, without having good reason - needless to say he got short thrift.

If you are paranoid about others making use of your information, then don't share. But is does beg the question why you put your tree on the site in the first place.

Well said, Paul, I don't use or collect trees like you do but agree with everything you say. Unfortunately this issue is going to run and run forever.

Perhaps we need a campaign slogan, such as: "You Canny own your Granny!" to counteract the die-hard conservatives.

Having an unusual name I am prepared to believe the info is sound, but of course I will have to check it.This "happened" in two areas on my tree so quite a nice suprise.

Well, I think that's different, Lindsey, because the way One World Tree works is that it is sort of shared by everyone who uses it - nobody "owns" that tree any more than anybody else. If a tree says it's a private member tree, that is a bit like the trees on this site - the owner can allow or deny access for other users - but the idea behind One World Tree is that it is open to everyone.

The only downside being (as someone says) it can be as accurate as the information on a GRO certificate or it can be crazily inaccurate, like some of the submitted information on the IGI and have John Smith (b.1820) marrying Mary Jones (b.1837) and having a son called Thomas Smith (b.1722) or something.

Just put my tree up on Ancestry and discovered lots of rellies I know nothing about MERGED automatically onto mine, on One World Tree.
Now I feel like a tree robber as I haven't researched any of them.I'm wondering how pleased the owners will be when they discover me?

Here we go again........I think this is the third or fourth thread on the same theme over the past week.

First of all anyone letting anyone else see their tree is sharing information. That is why we are on this site. I personally like to check any information anyone else may give me and I don't want to add hundreds of unrelated people to my tree but a number of members are gathering names even if tenuously linked.

This doesn't have to mean anything sinister or odd because they may be doing large area studies or creating big databases of names. I know of a number of very large databases of names online and these can be very valuable to researchers.

Secondly no-one should put sensitive or detailed information about anyone living on their tree on site because this problem is recurring one. There are members who like to add anything even remotely liked to their own tree and just copy blindly, even if that means adding living people. This is easily prevented if no-one on GR puts the names of living people on their trees.

Your immediate family should be disguised as something like Living Relative and there is no reason to put children on this site because their details are not needed for making contacts.

Just using the Hide Living relations option offered by GR is not enough as it is easy to work out names of living people in other people's trees if you know how.

The GR tree is not the place to save your full tree details. That should be done offline and if you meet any new contacts you want to tell all the family secrets to then you can do that by private message.


Sue
x

Hi Barry I made the same mistake my self by opening our Tree to someone .Not only that she had the Cheek to put my Familys names on her Tree without asking if she could .Has any body had that done to them
Eileen

Yes

I thought I'd replied to an almost identical message to this just a few days ago but this one wasn't on my threads.

It's understandable when new people on GR come on here and complain since they don't know it's a recurring theme but it's annoying if perhaps the same people are complaining over and over again.

Sue

Barry

You seem to make a habit of complaining about this type of 'happening'

The simple answer is not to allow anyone to have access to your tree.

I note also that you never seem to return to your threads once you have started them................

Reg

We have had a similar experience of a contact claiming a connection.Quoting several names from my tree. I was intrigued to say the least ,and asked in what way was he connected to a Mr X (c1864 - 1946) my grandfather. The answer that came back proved that people are just copying other peoples data without researching 'I am so far removed from MrX ,as I have 3200+ relatives that you would have to check the whole of my tree to confirm the connection' needless to say we didn't.All that I can suggest is that when a hot match appears and you open up make sure that you scroll down and UNCHECK the box that allows the person access to your tree.In the past you had to give your permission now the page is set so it is automatic unless you uncheck which is something that we do now as a matter of habit.

Opposite point of view for a second. I collect trees! If I find a match with a member, I'll happily ask them for a Gedcom file, of the entire tree. Once I have it, I'll merge it with what I have and send them back the results in a Gedcom of all the overlapping work. They then use the new info as a guide to future work, often saving them months of time and effort. As I do this with a lot of people, based on a core centre of my database, mistakes are quickly ironed out and I'll often find some superb new connections linking up numerous trees and assisting all concerned. I never claim the info is accurate as it has come from numerous sources, nor do I have the time to check off info against records, leaving that to those concerned I send the trees back to. Many would suggest that anyone stating IGI as a source is doing exactly the same thing, making a presumption of accuracy against a database.
I also disagree that anyone owns a tree. You obviously own your own data, but beyond that its normally a public domain which anyone could be intereted in. My work revolves around a village, all those who lived there, their ancestors and descendants, and therefore many are no natural link to my own personal tree at all. However I have an interest in collating their data. Genealogy doesn't have to be "your" tree!
My data is available to all, not just those who suddenly show up on Hot Matches every 2 weeks, but I run sites connected to the village where I make all that data available. My interest is to help others and give them as much as I can, clues, facts or even hunches! I wish someone could do that for me with my great great grandfather who I've been stuck on for over 30 years now!
Most of the above comments seem to me very insulated. I'm doing the work, therefore its my tree and I'm not willing to let it go. Why I ask myself have you joined this site? Surely its to share your data and hope others share it with you. If you get some more info, do what you all do best, go and check it out from PR's etc to ensure it 100% genuine, obtain the certs, census returns etc to prove it all fits, but don't knock those who try to provide some clues to assist. The point is I'd personally ask what purpose a Gedcom file will serve someone, ask them to justify why they want it. If you wish, be selective over what you send, impossible on GR, but not on most software packages, and finally work out what you'll get back from such an exchange, and look for some evidence to support any claims.
To back up my point of view, I also collect the emails I get back once a Gedcom exchange has been completed. 99% of well over 1,000 mails in the last 5 years have been along the lines of "Wow...thank you so so much". The 1% have been along the lines of "nothing new", maybe there wasn't, but it was good to establish we held identical data!
Interesting discussion
Paul

That is a shame, Maggie. For instance, my dad was born in Lancashire and Mum was born in Nottinghamshire. They met in London but married at Mum's parish church at home.

That would be like someone coming along who was distantly related to me and passing on the assumed information that because my dad married in Nottinghamshire, he was born there. (And then somebody who gets in touch with them goes off and finds my dad's correct birth details, says, "No, that's not him, X person says he's born in another place" and discounts it.)

This is why I always check people's information now, no matter how specific it is. A little voice in my head - especially if I read information that doesn't quite add up - is always saying, "You've got that information there - how did you get it and how can you prove it?"

I had someone try to swipe my tree, he was related to my dad's STEPFATHER so absolutely no relation, in reality to either me or my dad - but he took my mum's side of the family first - definitely no connection there - but he seems to have put his own idea of where they were born!! As many of his ancestors were born in Portsmouth, apparently, so were my mum's side!!
This makes a mockery of MY tree. Mind you, I'm not opening my tree to him again so he can get the true information, but if anyone contacts him, he says I gave him this false information!!!!!
All I can say, when people contact me is that he is a liar and thief who has a tree of nobodies, and perhaps they should ask him to verify his own information as no-one in my family was born in Portsmouth.

I have asked him to remove these names (for that is all they are - he knows nothing about them), but he refuses. As it stands, according to the info on GR, he's more related to me than my 3rd cousin

maggie

We have lots of correspondence on this, and it is clearly emotive.

There are two lines of concern. One is that all that hard work you have put into researching your tree is just taken willy nilly by somebody else. Well, I'm not worried by that, cos not all of my stuff is absolutely secure yet, part of the reason for putting it on Genes is to get the truth. And today I made contact with someone who pointed out that a child of a couple which I had was actually the child of their eldest daughter, and I was able to verify that.

I also don't have a problem with that if the person is genuinely related in some reasonable way. Again today, I made contact with a chap whose gg grandfather is the brother in law of my gg grandmother. I opened my tree to him and he is now free to load in my 1,000 rellies which mean absolutely nothing to him, if he so wishes, but at least he is a relative. I can't imagine why he would want to load them all into his tree unless he is aiming for an enormous tree, but I don't mind if he does, cos we have proven a connection.

What really annoys me is when someone is given access to my tree to determine if there is a relationship, and there isn't one, or at least not one that is obvious. And they then download the lot nevertheless. Then I think the exercise is pointless.

It makes a mockery of the art or science of genealogy, which most of us regard as serious. Okay, we aren't entirely certain that old Great Aunt Anne's child Mary was the daughter of her husband Abraham, but he brought her up, so that is good enough. But to just stick in relatives for the sake of accumulating names is stupid - and it is those who do it who lose out, not us.

They don't know how much of our trees are absolutely certain. I think mine is, but today I had to have a rethink over one family, that is the weekend's job.

Don't get too uptight about it. It is annoying but it doesn't affect you and your research really.

Just make sure you don't give the names of living relatives, especially not young children.

Margaret

Barry I don't agree with your contact's way of working but strictly speaking she is right, it's in the T &C's quote-

"Please note that, if you make your tree available to other Members, they may take entries from your tree and put them into their tree (even if you do not wish them to)."

There are at 2 other threads on page 2 which you may like to read, "Tree Bandits" & "Name Collectors"

I did have someone who asked if I could send my whole tree to them as a GEDCOM so that they could combine their information with mine and send it back to me.

I think I pleaded ignorance of how GEDCOMs work (which is true) and sent them a report from my tree programme instead. There wouldn't have been any point in them having my whole tree because the only relevent line was the one my grandma descended from. My dad's side of the family was totally irrelevent so I didn't send it.